Calgary or Lake Louise?

Neither is a place to swim in the sea, but Calgary at least has summer swimming. There are Sikome Lake in Fish Creek Park and Chestermere Lake, and you can float down the Bow on an inner tube. At Lake Louise the glacier-fed water stays near 4°C all summer, so swimming means a hotel pool or a drive to the shallower lakes near Banff.

Calgary has a real if modest food scene. It has steakhouses supplied by Alberta's ranches, ginger beef in Chinatown, craft breweries around Manchester and Ramsay, and good Vietnamese, Filipino and Lebanese cooking in the suburbs.

Lake Louise offers hotel dining rooms with a view, a bakery and deli for hikers and little else, at high prices and with bookings needed in summer. Its most memorable meal is soup and baking at the historic teahouses at Lake Agnes or the Plain of Six Glaciers. People who care about eating well drive to Banff for dinner.

Calgary is not a great sightseeing city, but it fills two days. There is western Canadian art at the Glenbow, the instrument collection at Studio Bell, the pioneer village at Heritage Park and the 1880s sandstone buildings on Stephen Avenue. Lake Louise has the Chateau and the old log railway station, both reminders that the Canadian Pacific line brought the first tourists, and almost nothing else. You go there for the mountains, not for museums.

Calgary has an ordinary but real night out. There are pubs and patios on 17th Avenue, bars in the East Village and country bars with line dancing and a mechanical bull. During the Stampede in July the city stays out late for ten days. At Lake Louise an evening means a pint by the fire or an après-ski drink in a lodge, and most guests go to bed early to catch the sunrise at the lake.

Both are places for the Rockies, and the difference is how close you are. From Calgary the mountains are a drive away: Kananaskis takes about an hour and Banff about ninety minutes. For rest days in town there are the Bow pathways, Fish Creek and the grassland on Nose Hill.

At Lake Louise the trails start at your door. You walk from the shore below the Victoria Glacier up to Lake Agnes and the Beehives, and Moraine Lake and Larch Valley are a short drive away. The Icefields Parkway leads north to the Columbia Icefield, and in winter there is skiing, skating on the frozen lake and snowshoeing in the forest.

Calgary has the wider choice of outings. Banff and Canmore lie to the west, and the Royal Tyrrell Museum's dinosaur fossils are in the Drumheller badlands to the north-east. To the south is Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump, a UNESCO site with thousands of years of Blackfoot history. Nearly all of them need a car or a tour.

From Lake Louise, most outings are into the landscape. Banff is the only real town trip, Field and Golden over the pass make modest stops, and Calgary is the nearest city, about two hours away.

Calgary has far more for children than the hamlet. There is a large zoo with life-size dinosaurs, TELUS Spark, Calaway Park, the summer mountain coaster at Canada Olympic Park and the Stampede rodeo in July.

Lake Louise suits families who like walking and paddling. Older children can canoe, ride the gondola to look for wildlife and hike to the teahouse, and toddlers can manage the flat lakeshore path. On a wet day, though, there is nothing indoors to fall back on.

Calgary is much the easier of the two to get around, at least within the city. The downtown grid is compact enough to walk, the Plus 15 skywalks keep you indoors on cold days, two CTrain lines reach the zoo, Stampede Park and the university, and the riverside paths make cycling between Kensington, Inglewood and the Beltline a pleasure. Beyond the core, though, buses are slow, and most visitors hire a car at the airport for the mountains.

Lake Louise has nothing like that network. The village is tiny, but the lake and the Chateau lie a steep 4km uphill and Moraine Lake is further along a winding road. Summer parking at both fills so early that you depend on park shuttles or the bus from Banff, and anything further, such as Yoho or the Icefields Parkway, means driving, with proper tyres in winter. In Calgary a car is a convenience, but here you plan each outing around a shuttle or a parking space.

Calgary offers the usual North American malls, independent boutiques and record shops in Kensington and Inglewood, and one real speciality: western wear. Long-established outfitters sell hand-made boots, felt hats and saddlery. Lake Louise has a small village mall with gear, maps and groceries and a few boutiques in the Chateau, enough to replace a forgotten fleece and little more.

Neither is cheap, but Calgary is much easier on the wallet. Outside Stampede week its hotels cost less than those in Canada's coastal cities, and food courts help. The costs rise once you head west and add a hire car, park passes and Banff hotels.

Lake Louise has few beds and charges some of the highest summer room rates in the country, and meals are priced for a resort. A hostel, the campground or a room in Canmore will cut costs, as will coming in late spring or autumn. Once you are there, the hiking is free.

Calgary has a dependable regional programme. The Calgary Philharmonic plays the Jack Singer Concert Hall, Theatre Calgary performs at the Werklund Centre, and Calgary Opera stages a short season. July adds the Folk Music Festival on Prince's Island and the Stampede's evening grandstand show. At Lake Louise the most you will find is a pianist in a hotel lounge, so for a concert or a play you drive to Banff.

The calm in both places comes from the mountains rather than a bathing culture, but you find it in different ways. Calgary has hotel spas and yoga studios, and its best places to unwind are a drive away: about an hour to the Nordic spa in Kananaskis, or ninety minutes to Banff's Upper Hot Springs.

At Lake Louise the quiet is right outside, with lakeside hotel spas and silent, snowy winter evenings, and the Sulphur Mountain pools are about three-quarters of an hour away. In July and August, though, coaches crowd the shore by midday.